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Man rescued from river jumped but was resuscitated, claims paramedic 21-Dec-10 – Chicago Police Department today confirmed that the elderly man rescued from the Chicago River on Friday did jump from the Dearborn Street Bridge. Police described him as white, between the ages of 65 and 70. His name has not been released. The dramatic rescue played out over 11 minutes in the middle of the afternoon on Friday on the main branch of the Chicago River in front of Marina City. Two divers jumped from a helicopter hovering over the river and a third swam out from the south shore. They tied ropes to the man, who was pulled out and taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital in critical condition.
A paramedic for the Chicago Fire Department, commenting on a YouTube video of the rescue, claims the man was resuscitated after fellow paramedics performed aggressive CPR, intubation (placing a tube down the airway), oxygen, ventilation (clearing the lungs), and intravenous drug therapy. “The patient was clinically dead,” wrote the paramedic, identifying herself only as Anna. “When divers placed [the] patient into [the] ambulance, the patient had no palpable pulses, no spontaneous breathing, no viable electrical cardiac rhythm, was gray, limp and unresponsive.” She says the man was resuscitated “all in minutes” and arrived at the hospital with a pulse and blood pressure. She could not immediately be reached for further comment. A media relations representative at Northwestern was aware of the rescue but could not provide an update on the man’s condition without a name.
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